Kieran Healy

Tue Oct 5, 2004

Every few weeks I hear about a new twist in American strategy or tactics. It always seems promising, but conditions don’t improve. On the other hand, officials in this administration don’t have a thought in their heads about not sticking this out.

I know there’s a word for this. Just give me a minute and it’ll come to me. Alternatively, the CT time machine can bring us back to last September:

The U.S.’s day-to-day problems in Iraq may end up resembling Northern Ireland rather than Vietnam: car bombings, political assassinations, a general effort by terrorists to violently undermine civil society and resist the occupying power. The cost in terms of soldiers’ lives would be much lower than in Vietnam, but if there’s no viable way to extricate yourself the feeling of the situation may be much the same.